An Intelligent Warehouse Management System Using the Internet of Things

Abstract

Nowadays, the warehouse acts as a competitive factor in any supply chain as it has a main role in linking all the partners in it. Hence, it has become very necessary to allocate its resources efficiently and manage it effectively. A sound warehouse management system can contribute to cost reduction and improve customer satisfaction. However, traditional warehouse management system models have become unsuitable and inefficient for today's market requirements. So, companies have started to adopt innovative approaches and technologies to be used for such applications; one of these technologies is the Internet of Things that enables the connection between several physical objects and produces a massive amount of real-time data that can be transferred to useful information that helps in managing and decision making. In this paper, the architecture of this application is illustrated, its potential benefits are overviewed and a framework of implementing this technology in a warehouse is proposed. This system can help in achieving more control and monitoring on all the operations in the warehouse in real time, increase speed and efficiency and prevent counterfeiting and inventory shortage. The proposed framework can be taken as a roadmap for enterprises to improve warehouses by using the Internet of Things. Also the benefits of implementing the proposed framework and its challenges are proposed.